Abstract
Escape routes keep firefighters safe by providing efficient evacuation pathways from the fire line to safety zones. Effectively utilizing escape routes requires a precise understanding of how much time it will take firefighters to traverse them. To improve this understanding, we collected GPS-tracked travel rate data from US Interagency Hotshot “Type 1” Crews during training in 2019. Firefighters were tracked while hiking, carrying standard loads (e.g., packs, tools, etc.) along trails with a precisely-measured terrain slope derived from airborne lidar. The effects of the slope on the instantaneous travel rate were assessed by three models generated using non-linear quantile regression, representing low (bottom third), moderate (middle third), and high (upper third) rates of travel, which were validated using k-fold cross-validation. The models peak at about a −3° (downhill) slope, similar to previous slope-dependent travel rate functions. The moderate firefighter travel rate model mostly predicts faster movement than previous slope-dependent travel rate functions, suggesting that firefighters generally move faster than non-firefighting personnel while hiking. Steepness was also found to have a smaller effect on firefighter travel rates than previously predicted. The travel rate functions produced by this study provide guidelines for firefighter escape route travel rates and allow for more accurate and flexible wildland firefighting safety planning.
Highlights
Suppressing and managing wildland fires places firefighters, the most fundamental and important resource for fire management [1], into potentially life-threatening situations
The travel rate functions produced by this study provide guidelines for firefighter escape route travel rates and allow for more accurate and flexible wildland firefighting safety planning
Approximately 44% occurred because of entrapment, which the National Wildfire Coordinating Group (NWCG) defines as “a situation where personnel are unexpectedly caught in a fire behavior-related, life-threatening position where planned escape routes or safety zones are absent, inadequate, or compromised” or burnover, which NWCG defines as “an event in which fire moves through a location or overtakes personnel where there is no opportunity to utilize escape routes and safety zones” [5]
Summary
Suppressing and managing wildland fires places firefighters, the most fundamental and important resource for fire management [1], into potentially life-threatening situations. Of 1910 [2,3] and 2017, 1128 firefighter fatalities occurred while on the job [4] Of these fatalities, approximately 44% occurred because of entrapment, which the National Wildfire Coordinating Group (NWCG) defines as “a situation where personnel are unexpectedly caught in a fire behavior-related, life-threatening position where planned escape routes or safety zones are absent, inadequate, or compromised” or burnover, which NWCG defines as “an event in which fire moves through a location or overtakes personnel where there is no opportunity to utilize escape routes and safety zones” [5]. Escape routes are pre-defined paths from a firefighter’s location to a planned area of refuge from fire danger, termed a safety zone. These two tools are a part of the Lookouts, Communications, Escape routes, and Safety zones protocol (LCES) [6], a series of four critical safety
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